PS5 Could Support V-Sync And Backwards Compatibility, Patents Suggest

Is Sony gearing up to introduce new tech with its next generation console?

As per two new patents registered by Sony, it seems like the PS5 might have a couple of new technologies to boast of, pertaining to inclusion of Vertical Synchronization (or V-Sync) and backwards compatibility technologies in the PS5. A patent filed in May of 2018, and approved a little over a week ago, suggests that Sony is working on technology that combines hardware and software sides of the process to achieve better frame rates.

Thanks to a technique that the patent dubs as “vertical blanking”, the tech makes it so that the refresh rate of the display device and the refresh rate of the system’s GPU would both coincide perfectly. So, for example, your screen’s refresh rate of 60 Hz and your game’s frame-rate of 60 FPS would both be 1:1 in line with each other.

The patent reads: “If the frame rate of the original graphics content, i.e., the rate at which new source frames are drawn to the frame buffer by the GPU, is perfectly in sync with the refresh rate of the display , each new source frame drawn to the frame buffer by the GPU would correspond 1:1 to each image presented on the display device. For example, if the display device has a refresh rate of 60 Hz and the GPU were rendering new images to the frame buffer at a frame rate of 60 FPS in phase with the refresh cycle of the display each image updated on the screen of the display would perfectly correspond to the source frames generated by the GPU.”

V-Sync is, of course, by no means a revolutionary or new technology, and is something that those who play on PC will be especially familiar with, but its inclusion in the PS5 would come as a welcome addition, especially if it makes for better performances in games.

But that’s not all. Backwards compatibility is something that we all crave in our consoles, and it seems Sony might be making plans to have that in the PS5 in a pretty huge way as well. According to a separate patent, which was recently updated by Sony, the PlayStation 5 might be looking to replace the concept of remasters by inherently having the ability to playing remastered versions of older PlayStation games through emulation.

“Each asset such as a texture called for by legacy software such as a legacy computer game software has a unique identifier associated with it,” the patent reads. ” The unique identifier can be rendered by imposing a hash on the asset, and then the asset stored with its identifier in a data structure. An artist remasters the textures for presentation on a higher resolution display than envisioned in the original software, and stores them back in the data structure with their identifiers. The original software is then played on the higher resolution display, with asset (such as texture) calls being intercepted, identified, and the data structure entered to retrieve the remastered asset having a matching identifier. The remastered asset is then inserted on the fly into the game presentation.”

Definitely sounds interesting. Of course, registering patents is something companies do all the time, and we shouldn’t take it as confirmation that either of these technologies will be included in the PS5, but it still seems quite likely. At least I hope they are. What are your thoughts on this? Let us know in your comments.